Tips & tricks to help you get the most out of your online advertising.

PPC Game Theory, Facebook Recruiting, and Other Top Stories from August

August was a busy month here at the WordStream blog. While you were sipping cocktails poolside or basking in the sun at the beach, we continued to cover the newly unveiled Expanded Text Ads in AdWords, delved into the fascinating world of game theory and how it can help improve your PPC campaigns, and even looked at how you can use Facebook to hire the rock-star talent you need for your growing team, among many other exciting topics.

Of course, we won’t begrudge the time you spent working on your tan – everybody needs a break from time to time, after all. We will, however, recap the most popular posts from the WordStream blog in August so you can catch up on everything you missed this month.

Even if you’ve been using AdWords for years, chances are you’ve overlooked at least a few of the platform’s most powerful – and surprising – features. In our most popular post of the month, Allen Finn walks you through three such features that you may have overlooked in AdWords, as well as how you can use these awesome tools to see even greater ROI in your campaigns.

Earlier this month, the Federal Trade Commission announced it was taking legal action against 1-800 Contacts for allegedly engaging in anticompetitive behavior in its online advertising campaigns. While many PPC experts were preoccupied with discussions about the impending suit, Larry decided to explore why, in his eyes, 1-800 Contacts had done nothing wrong – it had merely applied game theory to its PPC campaigns. In our second-most popular post of August, find out what game theory is, and how applying its principles to your own campaigns might be the smartest move you’ll ever make.

As any 12-step program could tell you, the first step toward dealing with an addiction is admitting there’s a problem. Whether they realize it or not, most marketers are hopelessly addicted to the sweet, sweet data we use every day to make decisions about our campaigns – but how can you really make sense of it all? In our third-most popular post of the month, yours truly examines eight cool marketing analysis tools that will satisfy even the most degenerate of data junkies.

Ranking in Google’s Featured Snippets (commonly known as the Answer Box) is a big deal. Securing a place in this coveted “position zero” on the SERP can drive immense volumes of traffic to your site and stablish you as a trusted authority in your industry, but competition for this placement is intense. Worry not, dear reader, as in our fourth-most popular post of August, Elisa offers you 10 question-based keyword templates you can use to capitalize on informational searches and maybe secure that elusive position zero spot.

If you’re a PPC advertiser, you may have heard about the recent launch of Expanded Text Ads in AdWords, a brand-new formatting feature that can help make your ads more appealing and engaging to prospective customers. For those of you wondering how to actually get started setting up Expanded Text Ads, this comprehensive guide (and free template!) by Erin is essential reading. By the time you’re done reading this post, you’ll know everything you need to create amazing Expanded Text Ads. What are you waiting for?

Many marketers live in mortal terror of what Google will take away from them next. These fears were realized earlier this month when Google announced that it was retiring Converted Clicks as a metric in AdWords. From September onwards, you will no longer be able to access converted click data. Instead, you’ll be forced to use the “conversions” metric, but what does this all mean for your campaigns? Mark Irvine digs deep to tell you everything you need to know about this crucial change.

Video marketing can offer amazing potential returns, but even the most sophisticated video recording equipment in the world won’t save a dull, uninspired campaign. Video demands that you get visually creative, and in this post, Wistia’s Margot da Cunha offers nine immediately actionable strategies for using and promoting video content. Essential reading for those considering or new to video marketing.

Although it’s still pretty rough out there for graduates and experienced professionals alike, the pressures of today’s employment market have proven challenging for many companies, too. The so-called “war for talent” remains a major problem for companies of all sizes, from scrappy startups to the tech giants of Silicon Valley, but sometimes, a little serendipity can result in amazing opportunities. In our penultimate post of this month’s round-up, Larry explains how a Facebook Ad led Justin Weyent to working at WordStream, and how Facebook Ads can be used as a compelling recruitment tool.

Landing pages can be a double-edged sword for today’s advertisers. On one hand, they’re an incredibly useful lead generation tool. On the other, they’re the “leakiest” stage of the conversion journey, and the point at which you’re most likely to lose a potential conversion – which is what makes solid landing page copywriting so crucial. In our final post of August’s round-up, Emma Siemasko outlines six copywriting principles you can apply to your own copy to increase conversion rates.

Dan Shewan

Originally from the U.K., Dan Shewan is a journalist and web content specialist who now lives and writes in New England. Dan’s work has appeared in a wide range of publications in print and online, including The Guardian, The Daily Beast, Pacific Standard magazine, The Independent, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, and many other outlets.